Isaiah 19:5 - Exposition

The waters shall fail from the sea . By "the sea" it is generally allowed that the Nile must be meant, as in Isaiah 18:2 and Nahum 3:8 . The failure might be caused by deficient rains in Abyssinia and Equatorial Africa, producing an insufficient inundation. It might be aggravated by the neglect of dykes and canals, which would be the natural consequence of civil disorders. Wasted and dried up ; rather, parched and dried up . Allowance must be made for Oriental hyperbole. The meaning is only that there shall be a great deficiency in the water supply. Such a deficiency has often been the cause of terrible famines in Egypt.